Author: therealwendynotanimposter

So I’ve just read this article on the Media Magazine thing that the library graciously provides for us media heads and I’ll have to say its darn interesting. It talks about how since the legalisation of LGBT marriages, on TV especially drama shows, these sexualities have seriously been put in a better light however we still see a difference between how male gays are shown compared to female gays. However the article covers two TV drama shows which have put lesbians in the spot light and have made them the protagonist. We’re talking about Orange is the New Black and The L Word. The acceptance of these marriages are becoming everyday more normal and the minority which still doesn’t accept this are receiving less importance from TV and other media sources. This article showed me how TV is changing for the better in the acceptance of those around us.

The movie which I have recently seen and I’ve decided to talk about is ‘Gimme Shelter’. A pregnant teen (Vanessa Hudgens) learns to break the bonds of her past and embrace her future after taking refuge at a shelter for homeless youths. Apple (Vanessa Hudgens) suffered an incredibly lonely and abusive past, living under the roof of her drug and alcohol addicted mother along with her mother’s many abusive boyfriends who gave Apple nothing but pain and misery. Therefore Apple couldn’t escape coming out and looking like a stereotypical ‘junky’ with the rough clothing, tattoos and ugly facial piercings that don’t compliment a young girl’s face. The world of drugs and alcohol stereotypically can be separated into two parties. One which is filled with glamour and bags of money and riches and those taking the drugs are usually glamorous rich celebrities which have too much money which they can handle and turn to using these substances. The other is filled with ‘bad’ people who have got the wrong idea of life and have turned all there opportunities and chances away and have turned towards drugs and alcohol to drown out the rest of the world. In this case, we are looking at a girl which from the outside looks like she’s ‘bad’ and it was her decision to take up drugs and sex and her decision to push away school and all other helping opportunities and because of her appearance we’d all avoid her in the street thinking her unwashed hands would dart out and reach into our pockets and take out our supposedly honestly earned belongings. But because of the representations and ideologies which we see in the media, we have grown these stereotypes of these druggies and haven’t fully understood why they are like that and only look at the outside. Like with Apple. She would of loved to of grown in a happy safe family, not having to sleep with one eye open at night and a permanent glance over her own shoulder. Due to these ideologies we look at Apples rough appearance and think that she’s thrown her whole life away and that she’s the one that doesn’t care when in fact her mother, the woman who was supposed to protect her and teach her and nourish her and keep her safe was the one who put her in all these horrid situation and had not allowed her to break through and to prove to us on the inside that Apple isn’t only a druggy with no hope but actually a beautiful loving girl which takes on life face forward and in the end battles for her baby and becomes the mom to the little girl that she never had.

As well as the people which lived along side Apple in those deprived and infested areas of America, the actual place as well was a stereotyped view that media has. Even though areas like that do have some elements from the movie, for movie purposes the film had placed every aspect of drug filled American towns in one single road, making us believe that everyone in those types of areas live like that.

So I’ve been asked to write some real deep stuff about some real simple stuff that you don’t usually give a second glance unless you’re like a poet or something.

So the first thing I’ve chosen to dive into deeper meanings about would be this circular object which we see every night. The moon is a planet which orbits the earth and is part of our solar system. However if we look at it deeper, for me the moon symbolises darkness and mystery, as usually its associated with nightfall and all the things that go bump in the night. Also the moon stands for the maternal influences so the moon represents women. It can also show subtlety, clarity, transformation and femininity.

The second thing I have chosen to look at in more detail would have to the ‘Common Raven’. The common Raven is a large all-black passerine bird. The bird being all black and usually associated with the grim reaper usually leaves us thinking dark things of it. For me the raven symbolises death, darkness, mystery but also beauty and the act of seeking something. It can also show pain for the crow of a raven is a loud, low, gurgling croak or a harsh grating sound.

My final item is the good old pumpkin. The pumpkin is usually associated with Halloween which can make you feel of childhood if you celebrate Halloween and for me personally it makes me think of warm homey smells like pumpkin pie and wood filled fireplaces and warm jumpers and crunchy leaves and candy filled baskets and toffee smothered apples and… GHOSTS AND WITCHES AND CINDER-IFFING-ELLA

The statement made by Marshall McLuhan,”The medium is the message” which means that the form in which the message is presented (print, visual, musical, etc.) determines the ways in which that message will be regarded and even though Media is growing everyday, can we still say this theory is relevant to todays society? McLuhan died in 1980, therefore his theory of “The medium is the message” may not be accurate for todays use of Snapchat and Instagram, things surely McLuhan didn’t have however I believe we can still say that “The medium is the message”.

Take a book for example that has been developed into a film. Very rarely the movies are exactly the same as the books and if they are they’re usually very long (like The Hobbit) or very badly made, however turning them into fast paced action packed features usually brings in the audiences and in some cases makes people want to read the books after as they are in more detail therefore scoring for the books as well.

The Harry Potter franchise has made over £15 billion, sold over 400 million books, translated into 67 different languages and is still going strong. However would the Potter collection still be as popular as it is today if the movies where made perfectly inline with the books? The thrilling tale of Harry and his courageous friends would not be as gripping and to be quite frank interesting if in the movies we visually saw every step, bath and toilet break they made in their lives in Hogwarts. However, if we only make the movies to show the most important and the most highlighted parts in the books, we allow ourselves an hour and a half of pure enjoyment and a cunning display of visual art. The fast moving pace allows us to grip onto our chairs, lean in and suck up every bit of information…..then suddenly it falls into a cliff hanger making us pain to want to know more. This draws an audience in, this builds a fan base and this shows us that the Medium can be the Message.

In todays society, Media Platforms play a huge role in the way we receive and disperse information for the world to see. There are three main media platforms which we encounter everyday. Broadcasting, Print and E-Media.

Broadcasting is a way to present information through moving image and radio. When watching TV or going to the cinema, we see movies, TV shows, advertisement, news rounds and many other forms of programmes. Each form separates into their own sub-categories. For example, television shows a variety of different programmes. The news rounds consist of daily or weekly news, weather forecasts, sports, traffic reports and many others. When watching the TV shows, they too are separated mainly into different genres such as soaps, thrillers, dramas and comedies for example “My wife and kids” or “Suits”. Everyday we are bombarded with advertisement after advertisement for law firms, car insurance, shop sales and thankfully we are no longer spending 30 seconds on every TV break watching those dreadful ‘Go Compare’ opera adverts. Continue reading “Media Platforms”→